Graphene, the atomic thin carbon film with honeycomb lattice, holds great promise in a wide range of applications, arising from its unique band structure and excellent electronic and mechanical properties. The gold rush of graphene research from 2004 also ignited one’s enthusiasm on 2D materials such as hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN), transition metal dichacogenides, graphynes, silicene, germanene, phosphorene, etc. The speaker and his group have been focusing their research interests on the growth issue of these kinds of 2D atomic crystals together with 2D chemistry. This talk will focus on their recent progresses towards the controlled growth of graphene and its 2D hybrids, as well as the graphdiyne, a sp-hybridized 2D carbon allotrope. The general strategy for graphene growth is to design and control the elementary steps of catalytic CVD process for achieving a precise control of layer thickness, stacking order, domain size, doping and energy band structure. A particular emphasis was laid on the design of growth catalysts, including bimetal alloys and groups IVB-VIB transition metal carbides. The talk will also cover their recent efforts on the direct synthesis of graphene on insulating substrates, which enable the transfer-free fabrication of graphene-based electronic and optoelectronic devices. It includes the controlled growth of graphene on h-BN and traditional glasses. Synthesizing graphdiyne with a well-defined structure is of great challenge. With a modified Glaser-Hay coupling reaction pathway, the speaker’s group succeeded in the direct synthesis of graphdiyne nanowalls on copper foils. Due to the highly-conjugated electronic structure, these graphdiyne nanowalls exhibited excellent and stable field emission properties.
About the speaker
Prof Zhongfan Liu received his PhD from the University of Tokyo in 1990. After a postdoctoral fellowship at the Institute for Molecular Science in Japan, he joined Peking University as an associate professor in 1993 and became the Cheung Kong Chair Professor in 1999. He is currently the Director of Center for Nanochemistry and Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology of Peking University. He also directs Beijing Science and Engineering Center for Low Dimensional Carbon Materials and chairs the Nanochemistry Committee in the Chinese Chemical Society.
Prof Liu’s research interest focuses on low dimensional carbon materials and novel 2D atomic crystals targeting nanoelectronic and energy conversion devices together with the exploration of fundamental phenomena in nanoscale systems. He has published over 420 peer reviewed articles and 26 Chinese patents. He also serves as Editor-in-chief of Acta Physico-Chimica Sinica, Associate Editor of APL Materials, Acta Chimica Sinica, and Chinese Science Bulletin, as well as advisory/editorial board member of Advanced Materials, Small, Nano Research, Natural Science Review, ChemNanoMat, NPG Asia Materials, and Journal of Photochemistry and Photobiology C: Photochemistry Reviews.
Prof Liu has received many academic awards and honors, including the Chinese Chemical Society-Akzo Nobel Chemical Sciences Award and Baogang Outstanding Teacher Award in 2012, and China’s National Award for Natural Science (2nd class award) in 2008. He was elected as a member of Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2011 and as one of the six outstanding scientists in the Ten-Thousand-Talents Program in 2013. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and the lnstitute of Physics in UK.
For attendees’ attention
The lecture is free and open to all. Seating is on a first come, first served basis.
